ANYONE interested in local history could do worse than look up Neil Mattingly's wonderful website.

He has been kind enough to give us carte blanch to plunder its riches for the Looking Back pages.

At the end of last year he and Ken Gollop gave a well-attended talk in Charmouth about the Isaac Hunter, who has featured in these pages.

For those who missed the talk it also made mention of the Gollop, Gordge and Gear families.

We'll let Mr Mattingtly tell the story:

The Gollop, Gorge and Gear families lived next to each other for nearly a century in a row of cottages at the top of Old Lyme Hill in Charmouth. There is a historic photograph of their houses which shows clearly their humble beginnings.

The Gear family are especially interesting.

For in 1839 Tobit Gear paid just £35 to Digory Gordge, clerk to the parish for a piece of ground on which he built a cottage.

He and his family were to live there for more than a century. He was described as a Tinman (pedlar) and lived to be 90 and his son, Matthew was a fish salesman.

This trade was in turn continued by his own son, Matthew, who also dealt in horses and had two offspring - Cecil and William.

There is a wonderful photograph of Matthew and his wife standing outside their family home. Cecil Gear, the eldest ran a successful fish shop at the junction of The Street with Old Lyme Hill, but his life was tragically cut short and he died in 1944 at the early age of 48.

His brother, William Arthur Gear, known as Billy was to become Charmouth's most famous business man.

He took a different path to the rest of the family and slowly built up an automobile business in a number of different premises.

He garaged his first cars in two sheds rented from Harold Pryer, the stone mason at the rear of "Devonedge" and then moved to the rear of the George Inn.

There is a delightful photograph c1925 of him and his workman outside the Inn with their vehicles.

He was only there briefly before moving to the rear of the Coach and Horses on The Street where he converted the old Stables into a garage.

He can be seen driving one of his cars out of the entrance to the garage in 1926. In the same year he is photographed outside The Royal Oak on Armistice Day.

He can be seen on the left in the middle row with a bow tie, which he always wore.

The group also includes a number of village worthies such as Ted Hunter, Bill Gordge and John Hodder, who is the bearded chap in the front with his dog. Billy married May the daughter of Jim Bridle who is standing at the back and was landlord of the pub.

In 1927 he built a small garage in Pears Close,west of The Abbot's House,which gradually grows into a substantial building shown in the photographs.

He had a well equipped workshop for repairs and serving. He originally offered Austin, Vauxhall and Standard cars for sale, but towards the end was a Ford agent.

He was able to offer cars as well as lorries for hire and ran excursions to local places of interest.

His business prospered and he later bought the large car park by the footbridge near the East Cliff and built a number of houses.

For many years Billy lived with his wife in the house (uphill) that is seen today between the Fish Bar and the Bank Cafe.

He was to retire in 1963 and for awhile the site became an engineering works owned by George Burgess producing wood stoves.

In time this came to an end with the business moving to Axminster and the building was demolished. A number of houses were built in 2001 on the site, which became Queens Walk.

Billy Gear lived on for another 10 years after his retirement enjoying much time on the golf course and died in 1973.